


Nothing Good in War Except Its End

by impala_deviations (Aedemiel)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: I Can't Believe I Wrote This, M/M, Out of Character, Pranks and Practical Jokes, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Why Did I Write This?, this is horrifying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 10:11:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13738659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aedemiel/pseuds/impala_deviations
Summary: Sam instigates a prank war that spins horrifyingly out of control.





	Nothing Good in War Except Its End

Dear Jody,

I am sorry I could not explain things adequately to you before, but I realize that you need to know how we have come to such an awful place.

It started, as these things often do, innocently enough. It had been quiet, as though all the monsters had gotten together and decided to take a holiday. So the only demon left to fight was boredom and the trouble with such a deceptive foe is that it tends to make people cross lines they would never ordinarily cross. Angels have known this for millennia, why humanity cannot learn this lesson continues to escape me.

It would be easy to blame Sam since he was the instigator of the prank war that went so terribly, horrifyingly out of control and responsible for much of the escalation. But that does not absolve Dean. He could have walked away. I am so very angry with both of them right now, but mostly with Dean and that hurts me. The Mark of Cain may be gone, but I wonder about the scars it left behind.

But I am getting ahead of myself. We should start at the beginning when Sam decided to play a small prank on his brother. I’m not sure where he got all of those strange, white things he calls ‘packing peanuts’ despite not looking like any kind of nut that I have ever seen. Nor do I know how he managed to fill the Impala with them. Dean did not seem to appreciate the joke, which at the time seemed a pity because truly, his face was quite amusing when he saw what Sam had done to his car. And so the war had begun.

Dean did not take long to exact his revenge. At first, he attempted to engage me in this silliness but I declined. I suspected that at some point I might need to intervene and hence my neutrality was essential. I couldn’t have known how right I was or foreseen that things would spiral so quickly out of the normal way that I was too slow to respond. But I digress. Dean, being the resourceful man he is, constructed what he called a ‘TP assault rifle’ which consisted of Sam’s hairdryer, a metal toilet paper holder and two rolls of toilet paper, and fired said weapon at Sam one morning as he was getting out of the shower.

Again, I thought this moderately amusing, although Sam did not laugh. Perhaps being covered in wet tissue paper is more unpleasant than I had imagined. But still, at this point the pranks were harmless and although I wished a case might arise to distract them from the campaign, the forces of darkness remained silent.

Dean, of course, was now the target of Sam’s irritation. And looking back, this was the first hint that things were going to escalate. Sam managed to adulterate Dean’s toothpaste with some kind of treatment for cold sores that produces a significant numbing effect. I was not convinced of the humor in this trick. Dean was roaring incoherently in the corridor in a manner most distracting, interrupting my ‘binge-watch’ of the latest series of Orange is the New Black. I was displeased. Dean was furious, and once the numbing sensation was removed by a judicious application of my Grace, he vowed his revenge would be sweet.

Dean is a clever man but likes to make people think he is not. Sam really ought to know better, however, having grown up with his brother. Nevertheless, Dean decided to make Sam wait for over two weeks before enacting his plan. Sam had settled into a smug sense that he had won this particular war. He was mistaken. Dean used a triple-pronged attack, replacing Sam’s deodorant with cream cheese, smearing hot pepper sauce on his bedroom doorknob and inserting a beef bouillon cube into the shower head. I was apprised of the situation when Sam appeared in my doorway, his eyes red and streaming as he explained how his morning had gone, beginning with a soup-scented shower and ending with his eyes burning and his armpits smeared with an edible dairy product. You can imagine his reaction.

I advised him to calm down. He did not seem to take this advice well, swearing to me that this time his brother would not win. I cautioned him against further escalation of hostilities but this only enraged him further. Still, even I could not have predicted what his next move would be.

I was actually grateful for the case Dean found the next morning. Nothing exotic, just a straightforward ‘salt-and-burn’ as the Winchesters like to call a haunting. I remained nervous about whether Sam would be foolish enough to prank his brother in the middle of a hunt and was glad when nothing untoward happened. The ghost was laid to rest and we were heading back to the bunker when Sam struck.

We’d stopped at a gas station near Huntsville, Alabama, and Sam offered to get coffee while Dean filled up the car. I admit that I had allowed myself to relax, believing Sam was waiting until we returned home to resume their ridiculous contest. I wish I had paid more attention to what Sam was doing, instead of talking with Dean about how we were going to find Amara. But honestly, that was the most pressing issue at the time.

When Sam returned with the travel cups, there was no sign on his face that anything was amiss. Dean has a poor poker face, but Sam is a master of controlling his facial expressions, so neither of us had any warning of what was to come. He simply handed a cup to Dean and joined the discussion of the Darkness and what she was planning. It was only at the end when Dean finished his coffee and tossed the cup into the trash that he made a remark that cracked Sam’s facade.

“That coffee tasted like piss,” Dean said, grimacing. It’s nothing he hasn’t said before since gas station coffee is reportedly not particularly good. I cannot offer an opinion, as my brief experiences with mortality did not convince me of the virtues of coffee, good or bad. I much preferred tea, and it is one of the few things I can still enjoy when I have my Grace. But at Dean’s declaration, Sam began to laugh. Not a mere chuckle but big belly laughs that reminded me of Gabriel when one of his tricks had gone particularly well.

I was immediately concerned. What had Sam done? I was not to be kept in suspense, as he immediately explained that Dean was absolutely correct about the coffee’s flavor, as he had urinated in the cup before giving it to his brother. I admit, his confession stunned me. I am not repelled by the fluids and waste products that mortals produce, but I know humans are not typically so sanguine. Sam’s prank had yet again escalated the situation and Dean’s face was so red with anger, it brought to mind those dark days when the Mark of Cain dominated his will. And then he went white, usually a sign that he was about to hit something or someone and I moved quickly to intercept him. His fury was justified, but I suggested that a fight at a gas station would only cause the staff to call the police and we did not need the attention of law enforcement. Finally, I convinced him to see sense and we left, but Dean was seething with temper for the rest of the drive. It was not the most comfortable experience.

He maintained an icy silence when we returned to the bunker, and I decided that I should allow him to regain his equilibrium, but not before I expressed my disappointment with Sam within his earshot. Sam was dismissive, to my chagrin, and entirely unwilling to listen to the voice of reason. He went so far as to suggest that I was overreacting.

I was frustrated, and I had no idea how Dean was going to respond or how I could defuse what was rapidly becoming a dangerous state of affairs. This is not the first of such prank wars between the Winchester brothers, but normally they back away from the cliff’s edge when it threatens to get out of hand. This time they were careening towards that Rubicon with no sign that they had any intention of stopping.

So I took the unusual step of consulting Crowley. Believe me, he was not my first choice of confidante, but he knows Dean well and understands the more unsavory aspects of human behavior. He was remarkably helpful, although I expect he will ask for a return favor at some point in the future.

“Dean’s not one to back down,” he told me. This I already knew and said so. “Yeah, but you don’t understand what it means.”

I understood perfectly, and this was hardly the help I had requested. But Crowley was as good as his word and explained that the only way out at this point was that I would have to engineer a situation where both brothers could save face. I complained of how ridiculous this was, and Crowley did not disagree. But he did have a plan and one that I thought would work. It was quite simple, and I regret that I did not see it for the mistake it was.

So I followed Crowley’s instructions and proposed a detente to discuss the terms of a permanent ceasefire. I arranged comestibles and alcoholic beverages to act as a social lubricant in the form of pizza and beer. To my considerable surprise and delight, this appeared to work. The brothers sat down and talked. Sam even apologized for stepping over the line and Dean was at his most affable, accepting Sam’s apology with good grace. I do not need to breathe, but I believe I let out a sigh of relief when they shook hands and agreed that this war was at a stalemate and declared it over.

My respite was short-lived. I blame myself for allowing complacency to override my watchfulness. After all, hadn’t they just agreed that this prank war was stupid and childish? But Dean is changed after so many months carrying the Mark, it would seem. Or perhaps it was his stint as a demon, a Knight of Hell. Whatever the cause, the old Dean was not especially sneaky or underhanded. Now, he has amassed considerable skill at misdirection and dissemblance, and I will admit it is disturbing to me. His patience is also much increased. Once, he was not capable of playing the long game but now he does so with ease.

He tricked both Sam and me into thinking he had let things go. So when he did eventually fire his next salvo, it was three months later and the war almost forgotten. He ripped a page directly from his brother’s book, but ‘dialed it up to eleven’ as Crowley later described it.

We’d stopped at a diner for food and fuel, and then driven on to the lakeshore in a nearby state park. It was relaxing and quiet, a welcome moment of peace. Dean was eating a cheeseburger and seemed content. Sam had ordered a salad, and even when he made an unhappy face, I was not alerted to anything being especially wrong.

“This dressing tastes weird,” he’d said. “Are you sure this is the raspberry vinaigrette?”

Dean had shrugged, unconcerned. “That’s what I ordered.” His tone was casual but there was a studied air to it that in retrospect I should have picked up on.

“It’s way too salty,” Sam complained. But it was not so awful that he did not continue to eat. And so the bombshell, when it came, took us both by surprise. Dean had disposed of the food containers and we were about to leave when he spoke up.

“Yeah, about that salad dressing,” he said, his eyes bright. All of my celestial senses began to jangle in alarm, there was something wrong with his tone of voice, with his facial expressions, even the way he was standing. If I were human, I believe my first thought would have been an expletive.

“You see, I ordered the salad without the vinaigrette, then added my own dressing,” Dean continued, with a weird emphasis on the final word.

Sam didn’t seem to be picking up on all of the warning signals. “Oh God,” he said, sounding resigned. “What did you do?” I don’t know what Sam imagined, but I am sure it was not anywhere close to what Dean had actually done.

Dean grinned at both of us, his delight and amusement plain. “Let’s just call it Dean Winchester’s Special Sauce.”

I had no idea what that meant, but Sam’s face paled. “Very funny,” he said, but he didn’t sound at all jovial. “No, seriously. What was it?”

“I am being serious,” Dean told him, openly laughing now. “I jacked off into your lunch.”

I cannot begin to express how appalled I was. Nor can I adequately describe the expression on Sam’s face. It was such a riot of emotions that I struggled to identify them all. I am a much simpler being when it comes to emotional states, so I could easily name what I felt. I was angry. I hadn’t felt this much fury at Dean in a number of years. What had he been thinking? Clearly, he had planned this out, biding his time and waiting for what he considered the perfect moment. I didn’t even bother to step in when Sam punched Dean in the face. It was probably safer than hitting Dean myself.

Dean didn’t retaliate, he just stood there smirking and wiping the blood from his mouth. Sam stared at him for a moment and then turned his back and silently got back in the car. I wasn’t sure what to make of this but I was more than happy to let Dean know of my displeasure. He was not very receptive to my admonition, and yet again I found myself wondering just how much the Mark and the experience of demonhood had changed Dean.

We drove back to the bunker in silence. Sam wouldn’t even look at Dean, and I cannot say that I blamed him as I could barely stand to look at him myself. I may not be human, but I understand that what Dean had done was so beyond the realm of acceptable behavior it was almost unfathomable to me that he had done it. I beseeched him to talk to me, explain what had driven him to such depths. But he was insensible to anything I had to say.

I am not ashamed to tell you that when Dean proved unmoveable, I begged Sam to let this go. Yes, he was the wronged party, but things had already progressed to a point where their relationship was in considerable jeopardy. I was not confident of success since Sam refused to speak to me, but I hoped he had at least listened.

It was a vain hope. Sam didn’t waste any time in making his next move. And yet again, he ratcheted up the stakes. Dean, for his part, was foolish to assume Sam would also play the long game and drank far more that evening than was smart. But I think he knew he’d overplayed his hand and was in typical fashion burying his guilt in intoxication. I had to carry him to bed when he eventually became unable to walk or even stand. Sam had retreated to his room hours ago and I suppose I too was foolish, not expecting him to strike back immediately.

I was reading in the library, an old text on the principles of pagan summonings that I believed might be relevant to a case I had identified earlier that evening. I was startled by a shriek in a register much higher than I had thought Dean capable of. It was undoubtedly him, however, and I ran straight to his room, fearing some kind of attack.

The scene before me was like something out of a nightmare. Sam stood there with such a wicked look on his face he was almost unrecognizable. And Dean was sat up in bed, some kind of thick white fluid dripping from his face. The smell in the air and my belated recognition that Sam was holding his penis in his hand told me this was not a story I wanted to hear.

I silently handed Dean a towel he had left on the back of a chair and waited. Dean wiped his face, making several sounds of disgust and Sam calmly tucked himself away and refastened his jeans.

“I can’t believe you,” Dean said to Sam. I couldn’t believe it either. Couldn’t he see how utterly self-defeating this was?

“Turnabout is fair play,” Sam said haughtily and strode out of the room. I caught his arm as he passed me.

“This has gone far enough,” I told him. “Too far, in fact. It ends tonight. I am done with both of you and this ridiculous game.”

“It’s not a game,” Sam retorted. But I could see a crack in his shell of self-satisfaction. He’d managed to horrify himself and maybe that meant he would finally back down. Except Dean also needed to agree to this and his stony silence was not encouraging.

“You should apologize,” I said, as sternly as I could. Sam actually looked ashamed, and I felt this to be a good sign. But there was still that spark of defiance in his gaze.

“I will if he will,” he declared. But there would be no convincing Dean of that while he still had Sam’s ejaculate all over his skin. Sam turned on his heel and left and I was on my own.

“Don’t tell me to get over it,” Dean warned me. “Sam needs to be put in his place.”

I tried to get him to see that this attitude was how things had gotten to where they were and that ultimately one of them was going to have to be the bigger man and walk away. Dean was the older brother, and maybe it was unfair, but I couldn’t see any other option than for him to accept he’d been bested and call an end to the whole stupid affair.

He was in no mood to listen to reason. He ordered me out of his room, went so far as to threaten to banish me if I did not leave him alone. I had to retreat at that point. I could see it was no idle warning and decided to regroup and try again the next day.

But the incident marked a turning point. The atmosphere in the bunker became unbearable, neither Sam or Dean made eye contact and even walked out of a room if the other was in there. I was at a loss and even Crowley was surprised by the latest turn of events when I called him in desperation and asked if we could meet.

“Castiel, you have to put a stop to this,” he told me when I arrived at our agreed meeting place, as though I hadn’t been attempting to do exactly that.

“I don’t know what to do,” I explained as patiently as I could. “They hate each other right now, and I can’t come up with a way to get them past it.”

“Dean’s stubborn,” Crowley mused, almost more to himself than to me. “Moose is probably your best bet. Convince him to break and he’ll figure out how to bring Dean around. The bond between the two of them is nothing you or I could ever understand. They’ve traveled this road before, and managed to get back on track.”

I must have sounded very distressed when I said that I had already tried to get Sam to bring things to a close, because Crowley was unusually nice to me, saying soothing things and listening patiently as I unloaded all of my problems onto him. Of course, he had to go and ruin it by offering to have sexual relations with me as ‘stress relief’. But in a way, it was comforting that at least Crowley was the same as he ever was.

When I returned to the bunker, it was to find Sam with a bottle of whiskey and a large, cherry pie from Dean’s favorite local bakery. I almost swooned with gratitude when I realized he had finally he had taken on board my words and had decided to apologize properly without waiting for Dean’s reciprocation. I deliberately did not go with Sam to witness his overtures to his brother, since I felt my presence might be disruptive. I did follow him and listen at the door surreptitiously but heard nothing that would give me cause to worry. So I left them to it. I will always regret that decision.

Once, the Winchesters used prayer to contact me, but cellphones ultimately proved more reliable and were not subject to being overheard by other angels. So I was taken completely off guard when in the early hours of yesterday morning, I heard Sam’s soul crying out to me. His levels of anguish and despair were worse than anything I had ever observed in him before. Not even the day I ripped down the wall in his mind that Death had placed there to protect him from his memories of the Cage and the Pit was as bad as what I felt from him then. I was genuinely concerned that he might hurt himself and so entered his room without knocking.

To this day, what I saw when I opened the door haunts me. Angelic memory is not like human memory, it never fades or changes with time. But this memory, how I wish I could scour it from my mind. It returns to me with disturbing frequency. I think it is similar to post-traumatic stress disorder, although I would not have believed it possible to suffer such a thing before now. But I am traumatized, to say nothing of the state Sam is in.

Sam was kneeling on his bed, his shoulders bowed as he wept copiously. He was wearing a t-shirt but naked from the waist down. On the nightstand was Sam’s computer and I could see a video file had been playing. It didn’t seem important and so I dismissed it and focused on my friend. As I got closer, the smell in the room and the sight of the sheets on Sam’s bed made me pause. Because I knew that odor and it was jarringly out of place. Blood and semen. My mind was struggling to process what I was seeing and so I forced myself to focus on Sam.

I asked him what had happened but he was unable to speak. He just pointed mutely at the screen of the laptop and rocked himself back and forth. I picked up the computer and braced myself before pressing the little triangle that for some reason indicates the machine should play the recording.

I can’t relate to you the horror I felt, and I do not wish to distress you but you asked me to tell you everything. I still feel an obligation to apologize in advance for what I am about to describe.

The first few scenes were filmed in the bunker kitchen, and it did not take me long to recognize Dean’s hand as he showed the camera a small pill that he crushed into a glass and mixed with whiskey. The screen went black for a moment and the next scene was in the library and filmed at a strange angle, which suggested that Dean had begun the recording secretly. I watched as he handed the glass of whiskey to Sam. Off camera, Dean made a muffled comment and then Sam drank the entire glass in one large swallow.

There was a perceptible jump, as though a portion of the video had been cut out, and then I could see Sam slumped over the table. He was not unconscious but he was extremely intoxicated. The time jump, based on the clock on the wall just barely visible in the video, can only have been ten minutes or so. Much too short a time for Sam to get this drunk. I realized then that what Dean had shown the camera minutes before was him drugging his brother’s drink.

The screen went black again and the next thing that appeared was Sam’s room. Sam was lying face down on his bed and Dean moved into the frame and began removing his pants and his underwear. I was frozen with shock, it was beginning to become frighteningly clear what Dean planned to do and I was scarcely able to believe it. Had I not been watching it with my own two eyes, I am not sure I could have believed it. I wanted to turn it off, but I had to keep going, to see if my worst suspicions were true.

Dean separated Sam’s buttocks with one hand and poured some kind of fluid from a small bottle over his fingers. He began to probe between Sam’s cheeks for a moment before withdrawing his hand and opening his jeans. He pulled out his fully erect penis and looked directly into the camera.

“Say goodbye to your anal virginity, Sam,” he said, in a strange toneless voice. Like he was detaching himself from what he was doing. Then he positioned himself behind Sam and thrust his penis into his brother’s body. I will refrain from further description of the sight of Dean raping Sam since I think it is sufficient to say that it was one of the worst things I have ever witnessed. When he was finished, he looked directly into the camera again and said, “I win.” And then the screen went mercifully black for the final time.

The thing that horrifies me the most is the level of planning that went into this. Dean conceived of this coldly and carried it out methodically, to the extent that I actually wondered if he were possessed, that his anti-possession tattoo had somehow been disabled. But he has passed every test I have subjected him too up until now. I have locked Dean in the basement while I figure out what has gone so catastrophically wrong with him. The Dean I know would never even contemplate doing something so heinous, and if he is not possessed I can only suppose that he is cursed or bespelled. I will find a cure, I swear.

Thank you for coming here to get Sam. I appreciate you letting him stay with you for a while. I believe it will be better for his mental health. He has not spoken to me since I found him, in fact, he seemed almost catatonic. I hope he might open up to someone he trusts and you were the only person I could think of. I apologize for not explaining things to you at the time, but I did not want Sam to have to relive it and I myself was barely capable of coherent thought.

Please let me know if you need anything from me. I will keep you updated on Dean’s condition.

 

Thank you,

Castiel


End file.
